Waiting for Cadel

Bradley Wiggins after Stage 14 of the 2012 Tour de France. (Daniel McMahon)

As the Tour de France field crested the final climb of Stage 14, Cadel Evans dropped out of the yellow jersey group with a flat tire. Time ticked inexorably by as Evans waited for a new wheel. By the time he could continue racing, he was more than a minute behind overall leader Bradley Wiggins. To make matters worse, Evans soon flatted not once, but twice more, as he tried to make his way back to the group.

Later, of course, the reason for Evans’s succession of flats became evident. As the yellow jersey group approached the summit of the Mur de Péguère, someone had spread tacks on the road. Nearly 30 riders suffered flat tires as a consequence. For Evans, it was a nightmare scenario, and the Australian kept his calm amidst the chaos in an impressive display of control.

Up ahead, race leader Wiggins heard the news and put on the brakes. Rather than taking advantage of his rival’s misfortune, Wiggins chose to slow and offer Evans, the defending Tour champion, an opportunity to return to the field. In some respects, it was an easy decision for Wiggins to make. He leads Evans by 3:19 in the overall standings, and he has outridden the Australian on each of the race’s crucial stages. Why bother taking two more minutes from Evans on the cheap?

But tradition also dictated that Wiggins wait. Cycling is a sport of unwritten rules. Waiting for a rival who has suffered a mechanical or a crash is considered good sportsmanship. Honor among thieves is celebrated in cycling, and stealing an advantage from a fallen rival is not fair play. One of the iconic images of the sport depicts archrivals Gino Bartali and Fausto Coppi sharing a water bottle as they climbed the dirt road of a high mountain pass in 1952.

More recently, Lance Armstrong was widely praised during the 2001 Tour, when he waited for his rival, Jan Ullrich. Ullrich, who played the perpetual second to Armstrong at the Tour de France, went off the road on a descent and landed upside down in the bushes. The German was uninjured, but he lost time as he extricated himself from the shrubbery and returned to the road. Armstrong held a solid advantage over Ullrich in the overall standings at the time of the incident, and the American won that year’s Tour by more than six minutes.

Two years later, Armstrong received his reward. On the lower slopes of Luz Ardiden, Armstrong crashed after his bars tangled with a spectator’s musette bag. Ullrich initially continued riding, and to this day, there remains controversy over who decided to wait for Armstrong. Tyler Hamilton rode to the front and very visibly slowed the favorites for Armstrong. But Ullrich also was also credited with waiting, and received an award in Germany his display of sportsmanship that arguably lost him his best chance of winning the Tour.

At the same time, it’s a tradition that is at times conveniently forgotten. The 2010 Tour showed just how tenuous the tradition’s hold can be when the race is in full flight. When Andy Schleck dropped his chain while attacking on the Port de Balès, Alberto Contador chased Schleck down and left him behind. Schleck lost not only his chain, but also the race lead. Fate still had a hand to play in that Tour, though. After a lengthy legal battle over a positive test for clenbuterol, Contador lost the 2010 Tour de France title. Andy Schleck became the race winner nearly two years after the fact.

Even within the same Tour de France, it is possible to see the wait debate swing in both directions. Though Contador did not wait for Schleck in 2010, during the first week of the race, Cancellara exerted his authority as race leader to slow the field on a descent made treacherous by rain. The field obediently slowed, and Sylvain Chavanel, who was ahead of the field thanks to an early breakaway, took the yellow jersey at the end of the day.

This year during the first week of the race, by contrast, when a massive crash scythed through the field on the long, straight road to Metz, there was no waiting for the fallen. For riders like Robert Gesink, Ryder Hesjedal, and Tom Danielson, among others, the crash meant the end of their yellow jersey dreams. Fabian Cancellara, wearing the race leader’s jersey, did not intervene this time. He either chose not to exert his influence or simply could not do so in the confusion of the moment.

Even on Sunday, not everyone accepted the efforts of Bradley Wiggins to neutralize the race for Evans. Pierre Rolland of Europcar attacked on the descent. Sitting in the top 10 in the overall classification, Rolland no doubt hoped to move up with his cheeky escape. After the stage, he said he did not realize what had happened behind him. That may be true, but Rolland’s statements have not quieted the criticism of what looked like a grasping effort to profit from others' misfortunes.

Cycling is a social game, and much turns on the relationships among riders. The top cyclists and teams race one another repeatedly, and memories are long. Luck can turn in an instant, and when misfortune comes to you, it is always nice to have friends in the peloton. A rider who doesn’t contribute to a breakaway may soon be left behind or may find it difficult to join an escape in the future. A yellow jersey who waits for a rival can hope to receive a similar favor down the road.

At the same time, it is a race, and there can be only one winner. The tradition of waiting for fallen rivals seems to be honored most often by riders who have little to lose by it. Armstrong led Ullrich by a significant margin. On the Port de Balès, by contrast, Contador had everything to gain by continuing to race.

Always in cycling a rider must calculate. What is there to gain by attacking? Which do I need more—time on the road or goodwill from my rivals? For Wiggins there was everything to gain and nothing to lose by waiting on the road to Foix. He burnished his image as a generous and classy champion who respects tradition. And Wiggins may yet need a favor in return from Evans and his BMC Racing Team before the Tour reaches Paris. It’s rarely a bad thing to make friends in bike racing.

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